Dept. of raise the seat: OSU basketball team does the 'Tour de France'

iPhone hoisted by Shawn SchoefflerThe Oregon State basketball team toured Paris on bikes

It was a four-hour bike tour of Paris followed by a stop over at Notre Dame for coach Craig Robinson's Oregon State basketball team.

Shawn Schoeffler, the OSU hoops sports information director, wrote an entertaining narrative - replete with stats and 'firsts' - after the team's first day of travel.

A sample of the story ...

PARIS, France - Unless you like reading about people
sitting on a bus, waiting in an airport or sleeping on a plane, the
first blog about the Oregon State men's basketball trip to Europe won't
excite you much. But there was an unfortunate snafu and a spirited
practice in front of locals that should make it worth the read.

The coaches, student-athletes, support staff and boosters all
boarded a bus at Gill Coliseum at 4 a.m. on Saturday for the short jaunt
to PDX. After checking bags and getting through security, each person
went their own way to find food. The United flight departed right on
time at 8:25 a.m. and there wasn't an open eye in the group as everyone
quickly fell asleep.

After the plane pulled into Houston and people checked the board
to find out the gate number to Paris, disappointment set in as the 3:30
p.m. departure time had been delayed to 7:05 p.m. Food, cell phone games
and laptops helped ease the frustration of the long delay and United
even offered $10 food vouchers to every passenger for the mechanical
issue that forced the delay.

OSU coach Craig Robinson looks like he's ready to ascend the Alps

When Daniel Gomis
went to the gate to collect his voucher, he was told he would be unable
to fly to Europe because his passport from Senegal also required a Visa
that he didn't have.

After panic, begging and several phone calls, it
was decided that Gomis had no choice but wait until Monday to get his
Visa. Assistant coach Nate Pomeday
stayed in Houston with Gomis and the two are expected to fly to Paris
on Monday and join the team later that day or early Tuesday.

Everyone was bummed that Gomis and Pomeday had to stay back for a
couple of days, but the frowns turned to smiles when the group boarded
the large and luxurious plane that included a television, pillow and
blanket at every seat -- all surprisingly for free -- and plenty of leg
room for the players used to cramming into small spaces.

The plane finally left Houston at approximately 8 p.m. CT and
pulled into Charles de Gaulle International Airport in Paris at 12:30
p.m. Central European Summer Time (CEST) on Sunday. In all, the travel
time from Corvallis to Paris took 23 hours, 30 minutes, more than four
hours that what had been scheduled.